A FEW years ago, Angus Deaton, the Nobel Prize-winning Princeton University economist, working with Anne Case, his wife, researched the changing patterns of life expectancy in the United States. They divided the population into several socio-economic categories. They noticed to their great surprise that one group had seen a decline in its life expectancy while all others, including the low-income blacks and Latin Americans, saw some increase.

The group that had fallen behind was identified as that of the low-income, non-college educated whites. A good proportion of these lived in what was called the "Rust Belt", where once prosperous industries provided easy employment and comfortable incomes to their workers. However, many had died or simply moved out. Globalisation had persuaded the owners of these industries producing mostly steel and steel products to close shop and move their production lines to countries such as China, which had large supplies of cheap and disciplined workers.

This transfer of jobs meant greater joblessness or lower wages. The result was great economic discontent against those who had championed the opening up of the global economy. For this group of people, the "globalists" were the enemy. In almost total despair, this group had turned to alcohol, drugs and suicide to ease their pain.